Tommie suddenly nudged Hank. She nodded towards the cliffs. On the sky edge of the cliffs something black showed, then it withdrew.
“Men,” whispered Tommie.
“Mexicans,” murmured Hank. The eerie feeling came to him that behind those cliffs, in the gullies, men were swarming: that Sinaloa had beaten up its bandits and desperadoes, just as he had expected it would, and that the call of the diamonds like the call of a corpse in the desert was bringing the vultures. They would connect this new crowd just about to land with the treasure business. If they showed themselves too soon, then McGinnis and his men would be frightened off. McGinnis was bad, but the Mexicans were worse. Hank did not often say his prayers, but he prayed just then that cunning might be granted to the greasers not to shout before the game was corralled.
He needn’t.
There came far away voices from the sea and the creak of oars—nearer.
“Get your hind legs ready,” whispered Hank.
Crash! the oars were in. Then came a burst of yells as though a pack of demons had suddenly been unleashed and unmuzzled.
Hank sprang to his feet. Leading the others, he dodged round the north side to the seaward side of the rock. A hundred and fifty yards away to the south a big boat had been beached. It lay unattended. Like a pack of hounds on a hot scent the McGinnis crowd were racing up towards the tents. You could have covered them with a blanket. Blind to everything but loot and vengeance, a trumpet would not have turned them.
Hank seized Tommie by the hand and started.